title: Whole saliva and the diagnosis of Sjögren's syndrome: an evaluation of patients who complain of dry mouth and dry eyes. Part 2: Immunologic findings.
abstract: Sjögren's syndrome (SS) is a multisystem, autoimmune disease characterised by generalised desiccation, exocrine hypofunction and serologic abnormalities. Last year we showed that the antibodies which are quasi-specific for diagnosis of SS, anti SS-A/Ro and anti SS-B/La, were present in the saliva of patients with this disease.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To determine their presence in patients who complain of dry mouth and dry eyes.
  
  
  METHODS
  The study was conducted at the School of Dental Medicine, SUNY at Stony Brook.
  
  
  METHODS
  There were 49 patients (Mean Age = 54 +/- 13 years).
  
  
  METHODS
  Serum was analysed for the SS and other antibodies with "Western Blot Autoantibody Strips".
  
  
  RESULTS
  The findings showed that there was a strong correlation between the presence of the SS antibodies in the serum and the saliva. The SS antibodies were primarily found in the saliva of the patients whose resting and stimulated, whole saliva, flow rates were abnormally low. Antibodies to other autoimmune disease (lupus, scleroderma and mixed connective tissue disease) were also found in whole saliva.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The findings in Part 1 of this study, of patients who had complained of dry mouth and dry eyes, suggest that those patients, who demonstrated low resting and stimulated flow rates and had lacrimal hypofunction, suffered from SS. The observation in this paper, that the whole saliva of these patients contains the SS antibodies, confirms this diagnosis. The data suggest that whole saliva can be used to establish the diagnosis of SS and other autoimmune diseases.
authors.affiliation: Department of Oral Biology and Pathology, State University of New York at Stony Brook, USA.
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Sreebny
authors.forename: W X
authors.initials: WX
authors.lastname: Zhu
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000974:Antibodies, Antinuclear / Q000097:blood; D001327:Autoimmune Diseases / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000276:immunology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D016014:Linear Models; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012217:Rheumatoid Factor / Q000097:blood; D012463:Saliva / Q000737:chemistry / Q000276:immunology*; D012859:Sjogren's Syndrome / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000276:immunology; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric
chemical_list: D000974:Antibodies, Antinuclear; D012217:Rheumatoid Factor